Participants and their projects

Albania

Anisa Hysesani, Albanian Youth Council

My project idea

We will create a sustainable national body within the Albanian Youth Council, coordinated from the Home Office based in Tirana, in the Tirana Youth Center and with branches in Himara (Greek Minority), Shkodra (Montenegro Minority), Kukës (Kosova Minority), Pogradec (Macedonian Minority) and Elbasan (Roma Minority) for the Protection and Promotion of Human/Youth Rights.

In the First Phase (4-6 months) of the project I propose to create the Youth Rights Network and to start the preparation and training of each unit by raising their capacities and knowledge on Human Rights, Peace Building, European Values, Fundraising, Staff Management, Youth Work, etc so they will be ready to deal afterwards with the local contextual youth problems through different local forums during the project and after the end of this project.

In the Second Phase (4-6 months) of the Project I propose to focus mostly in the interaction of the communities of different nationalities or different ethnic origins included in the project, through exchanges, joint meetings, forums, trainings, youth clubs, online meetings in social forums, etc.

My initiatives for peace-building

In April-May 2011 I organised different round tables with local and national Albanian NGOs, and talking to them about YPA project. I also carried out a training on human rights with students from different universities and young people from NGOs of our youth network.
We organised also an event called Human Dignity and Peace Building in Europe ( Council of Europe-special guest Mr. Marco Leidekker & Albanian Youth Council-June 23, 2011). As an output of this meetings I created a Youth Newsletter with the sustain of my organization Albanian Youth Council which gives to young people a way to interact with each other through their written opinions and through the all given information in this newsletter about civil society events.

Armenia

Tigran GRIGORYAN, European Movement

My project idea

Teachers and young activists play their important role in forming of values among masses. That is why it is important for these people to have good competences and knowledge in human rights education. Having competent teachers and civic activists is the basis of sustainability of formal and non-formal education. My project is to train these people on human rights. The training will inspire young people to become actors of change in their society, will share knowledge and develop basic skills of self-organization and civic participation. The project will also provide participants with all necessary skills and knowledge in the sphere of non-formal education and will develop competences in different directions of human rights.

Although pupils in Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh have human rights courses at schools, however, this course is mainly held by history teachers who apply traditional methods, the latter is mainly based on Soviet methodology. The objective of the project is to develop skills in non-formal education as well as knowledge in the sphere of human rights.

My initiatives for peace-building

On July 14 2011, a conference on human rights entitled “All equal all different” was held at the ABC office in Stepanakert. The aim of the conference was human rights education and promotion of such high values as equality, dignity and justice in Artsakh.
The conference had two panels. The first panel discussed general issues on human rights, for example, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, International Law, etc. The second panel discussed different cases worldwide where violations of human rights occur. The most debatable were questions about people’s right to self-determination and rights of the migrants and people from unrecognized countries in abroad.
The conference was attended by representatives of NKR Ministry of Foreign Affaires, NKR Ministry of Culture and Youth Affaires, various educational institutions and NGOs, as well as lawyers from the Ombudsman’s Office. Karen Pong and Vahram Ayvazyan, participants of the YPA project from Greece and Armenia, joined the conference by skype.
Karen Pong’s role: “I was honoured to have been approached by Tigran to take part in this conference. I was asked to give a short speech on why human rights are important and to describe the situation of human rights violations in Greece. Though I was unable to present the entity of my speech due to time constraints, I was however, able to put across the notion that human rights are an important part of how people interact with others at all levels in society – in the family, the community, schools, the workplace, in politics and in international relations. The audience was particularly shocked at my description of the situation in Greece, which remains lamentable. My main conclusion as to the human rights violation in Greece, especially towards migrants, was that there is still a long way to go in terms of respecting those rights. I was equally very pleased to answer questions posed by a couple of participants.Overall, the conference was very resourceful, in that it is a good indication of how Youth Peace Ambassadors participants can work together in upholding and promoting those values fundamental to the Council of Europe”
Vahram Ayvazyan’s role: “I was very happy with Tigran’s invitation to take part in this conference-meeting. It is of essence to highlight the cooperation of Youth Peace Ambassadors (Karen, Tigran and me) and our endeavour to work hard on human rights issues together. The conference itself was full of emotions and questions. Due to lack of time I couldn’t manage to comprehensively illustrate the human rights values and their allocation in the South Caucasus. Instead I focused on the overall introduction of the need to foster the development of the youth and NGOs and to raise their role in society. I was trying hard to convince the participants of the conference that to throw away stereotypes, build new relations and live without conflicts is a must and such meetings, projects and initiatives are of great importance and can break stalemates. Since the participants were mainly from Nagorno Karabakh, to respect the human being as an outstanding and central value was put forward by attendees. In the end of my speech a real debate started on unrecognized states (such as Nagorno Karabkh) and how to face the challenges and overcome obstacles in this respect. And Tigran’s case was an excellent example for others to see and learn that “every no gets you closer to a yes. I hope that our cooperation will last for a long time and I am open to take part in such events.”

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Tigran Grigoryan has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Human rights training for young teachers and civil activists” from 25th to 29th July 2013 in the autonomous Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh.

The project, in a format of training course, aimed to gathered young people and teachers and empower them to become actors of change in their society by sharing knowledge and developing basic skills of self-organization and civic participation. The training course provided participants with all necessary skills and knowledge in the sphere of non-formal education and human rights. Thought the project, the participants were provided with the specific competences in order to be multipliers of human rights values and non-formal education methodology.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by involving other actors.

My project idea

The project aims at stimulating the reconciliation and enhancing the confidence building between the young population of Gyumri (Armenia) and Diyarbakir (Turkey) thus enhancing and educating the youth on the two sides of the laced Turkish-Armenian border. The activities within the project include: 20 students and young artists from Gyumri and Diyarbakir participating in peace camps, training on the issues of conflict transformation, human rights, respect for diversity and equality; workshops on national dances and music concerts.

The Turkish-Armenian border remains the last laced border of 21th century. The borders all over the world are getting dropped, while the one among Turkey and Armenia looks have not many chances even for opening. The situation is same ridiculous and terrifying, when one faces this impassable wire wall in the age of globalization and integration. Because of the closed border and minimized communication the societies in both countries still carry the loads of prejudices labeling each other as historic enemies and not very trustable neighbors. This is especially true about the younger population who are more categorical in their claims and believes. Accordingly, young people need to recognize each other by living together, to get educated with peace education.

My initiatives for peace-building

On June 8 and 11, 2011, two-day training course on Children’s rights was organised at the youth center of KASA Swiss Foundation based in Gyumri, Armenia. served as an impetus for further activities.

Children aged 13-16 took part in the training. Within two days the children got the introduction to the Convention on Children Rights. The program helped the participants to learn about the links between human needs and human rights, the consequences of human rights violations through different activities and games. Much emphasis was put on the topic of discrimination and xenophobia, the discussion of which resulted in their common conclusion that all humans are equal and each person needs to be respected.
This training course derived from the need of the community where children are vulnerable in terms of violation of their rights. Moreover, among the children who participated in the training there were those who fell victims to rights violations - some of them were subjected to violence and neglect at their families, some were discriminated at schools because of poor financial conditions. Thus, conducting of the training was of great importance as not only it helped the children to get informed about their rights but also served as an impetus for further activities.

Seg KIRAKOSSIAN, 'World Independent Youth Union' NGO

My project idea

The project “Youth for tolerance”, that will be implemented in Armenia for 60 high school students (seminars in 5 schools, 12 participants in each) for 17 working days (3 days in each school, 1 day party and 1 day general meeting) by the end of 2012 will be focused on increasing the atmosphere of tolerance in the community.

The project is needed because lots of people especially boys in this community violate other people for their non-standard/non-traditional way of thinking or for nationality.
Particularly:

A lot of people in this community think that to be a good citizen means to be nationalist, because Armenia surrounded enemies, as they say, and in their opinion multicultural community will destroy Armenians’ “National spirit”. They spread nationalism. Young people in this neighbourhood are intolerant to national, cultural and religious minorities so seminar debates are aimed to make this 60 high school students more open-minded and tolerant towards religions and nations as well as different cultures’, subcultures’ and social minority representatives.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Sergey Kirakosyan has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Intercultural learning, human rights and tolerance for peace” from 06th November to 25thDecember 2012 in Yerevan, Armenia.

The aim of the project was create an intercultural dialogue and realize the importance to being open-mind and tolerant through a series of workshops. The target group of the project were 65 young people between 14 to 16 year’s old living in Yerevan.

The project has intercultural and sub-cultural aspects. The movie heroes (educational material used during the workshops) are representatives of ethnic, religious, language, sub-cultural, social (disabled), sexual minorities. There were also held discussions about the intercultural learning and the importance of diversity. During the final meetings, participants also met with representatives of minority communities and had safe environment to develop dialogue.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by enhancing the understanding of wider European context and educational perspectives, opening horizons of global thinking and intercultural understanding. It was very important in the project framework that the European dimension of the workshops was based on the universal system of values, as many teachers who participated in our discussions were referring to Armenian national values bringing them as an argument against tolerance.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it had intercultural and sub-cultural aspects: the movie heroes (educational material used during the workshops), in fact, were representatives of ethnic, religious, language, sub-cultural, social (disabled), sexual minorities. After the movie screening it were held discussions about the intercultural learning and the importance of diversity. Moreover, during the final meetings, participants also met with representatives of minority communities and had safe environment to develop dialogue.

Seda PAPOYAN, 'Arit' cultural NGO

My project idea

“Here I am” is an interdisciplinary project with a gender perspective, aimed to create a new online “portrait” of Armenia through blogging and photo documentation of different community problems outside the overcentralized capital Yerevan. The photos will depict different situations of Human Rights violations that happen in the society. Those issues are to be identified and made into stories by young girls of 18-25, then a professional photographer will try to show the story in photos. All these text and photo stories will be mapped on a special webpage with GPS navigation. The project is considered to be presented in all the communities taking part also exhibiting the real stories.

Azerbaijan

My project idea

Project title: Students' solidarity for better future

The project has two phases:

1st stage: 15-20 Azerbaijani students (boys and girls- gender balance is very important) gather in Baku to have trainings on human rights, peace-building and conflict transformation, intercultural dialogue

2nd stage: Around 20 students from CIS countries come to Azerbaijan to have about a week long summer camp that will be focused on intercultural dialogue, human rights and peace-building processes, and common problems faced by the students in the participating countries. Azerbaijani students chosen at the 1st stage will be acting as a hosting side.

The project aims to develop students’ knowledge and attitudes regarding human rights, peace-building and intercultural dialogue as also to strengthen their spirit of tolerance, being open to diversity

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Nargiz Abdullayeva has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Youth for Peace” from 5th to 7thJuly, 2013 in Baku, Azerbaijan.

“Youth for Peace” project brought together 20 students from Baku’s universities and provided them with training on Intercultural Dialogue, Human Rights, Peace-building and Conflict Transformation through non-formal education.

The three-day training started with games and activities to help the participants to get to know one another. This ice-breaking followed with introduction of the “Youth Peace Ambassadors” program and other youth projects of the Council of Europe, as well as the presentation of AEGEE-Baku. Afterwards, the Acting Head of the Council of Europe in Baku, Mr. Teymur Malik-Aslanov, presented the general information about Council of Europe, Membership of Azerbaijan in this organization, our country’s obligations towards the Council of Europe, the representatives of Azerbaijan in the Council of Europe. He also mentioned the employment and internship opportunities within the Council of Europe.

On the next day, the Bennett Model of Intercultural Sensitivity was presented by the facilitator at Youth Peace Camp 2012-Raul Gulmammadov, and followed with another presentation of Human Rights Concepts by another Youth Peace Ambassador- Aydan Karimli. By the end of the day guest speaker- Governance Programme Coordinator of Oxfam International in Azerbaijan- Mr. Orkhan Aliyev introduced to the young people the presentation “War for Peace or Food for Peace” during which the students were also defining the basic terms related to the peace-building and conflict transformation processes.

All these presentations, as well as another presentation on Conflict Transformation by participant of Youth Peace Camp 2011- Nargiz Guliyeva, were going along with activities and games to make all the participants involved and give them also some practical experience. After a workshop “Active listening in Peace-Building and Conflict Transformation” the participants filled in an evaluation forms and shared their thoughts and opinion about the project. Moreover, the project was created through an unique platform for the Azerbaijani participants of different Council of Europe youth projects for facilitating and sharing their experience with the local youth, to guide them in the path of self-development and peace-building.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by educating young people on the subject through presentations, activities, workshops and videos. Moreover, during the project evaluation process most of the participants mentioned that they have acquired a lot of knowledge in the field of peace-building, learnt new ways and tools of peaceful conflict resolutions which they could also use in their daily lives.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it was one of the subjects of the project, as one of the session held made the participants realize how important Human Rights are and discuss on Human Rights dilemmas. Also, participants worked in small groups making definitions of the intercultural sensitivity.

Nail ABDULOV, National Assembly of Youth Organizations of the Republic of Azerbaijan

My project idea

The idea of the project is based on promotion of peaceful values and breaking the stereotypes in Azerbaijan and Armenia.
The participants will be youth leaders from both countries. The target group is young people living in Armenia and Azerbaijan. The project will start with local preparatory meetings in each country. After the preparatory meetings the participants will have bilateral meeting. During that meeting the participants will create the network for the future joint activities that will promote the peaceful initiatives on the local level. Youth leaders of Azerbaijan and Armenia, especially those who have an experience in the fields of human rights, peace-building and conflict transformation, will be trained in order to proceed the aim of the project by initiating the relevant ideas and organizing the local activities based on those initiatives.

Young people in my community are facing a lot of different challenges. But coming to the topic of my project I can define the following challenges: most of young people in Azerbaijan are living with the stereotypes about Armenians. Azerbaijani and Armenian communities are separated and this fact intensifies the hate speech among young people. Another issue is unawareness and unwillingness to understand the needs of the opposite side.

The issue of political participation of young people in the region is important for both communities. It is not about when young person becomes a member of the political party, but making decisions and bringing democratic initiatives as an individual or within an NGO. In my point of view young people of the region are inclined from the course of social participation and it is important to encourage our youth to have their say through active participation in decision making towards the democratic and peaceful development of the region.

After the local preparatory meetings the participants will be supposed to have a meeting in neutral country (it can also be organized in one of the EYC). During the bilateral meeting participants will create a network of young peace-builders.

After the first networking meeting participants will start their local activities. The local activities will need to be relevant to the aim of the project and the target groups of the activities should be young people from both communities. The project will not end with only networking meeting it is also supposed to have following bilateral meeting where youth leaders will share what they have done and what steps to take in the future or which activities to do in order to proceed the idea of the project.

My initiatives for peace-building

Session on the different perceptions on (im)migration in the different partner countries within the project “Start inclusion of young migrants in the process of European integration” 12-15 May, 2011 in Baku, Azerbaijan.

The session was organized within the above mentioned project. It was international meeting with participation of local youth leaders as well.
The aim of the session was to define the obstacles of integration of migrants in the countries and how to overcome those obstacles by raising participation of young migrants in society. Participants shared the realities concerning the state of migration in Azerbaijan. The official representative from the State Migration Service was invited to give the general information about the migration policy in Azerbaijan.
Participants from other countries (Belgium, Finland, Italy, Latvia, Turkey, Russia, Ukraine, Georgia) also shared information about the state of migration in their countries.
The session on the work of Council of Europe in youth field was also added. Within this session participants were given information about the European Youth Foundation and project management.

Jeyhun ASHIROV

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Jeyhun Ashirov has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Youth Creativity in Conflict Resolution” from 19th to 27th September 2014 in Ganja, Azerbaijan.

The project aimed to deal with conflict and conflict management had the following objectives:

to understand basics of conflicts, conflicts dynamics and conflict resolution;
to share and discuss current conflicts in Europ;
to empower and motivate young people to take an active role in conflict resolution and reconciliation processes as European Citizens;
to elaborate creative means of conflict resolution on a local level.

Direct beneficiaries of the project were team of facilitators and participants who took part in planning and implementation process of the project. Indirect beneficiaries of the project were people who attended meeting at the office of the Non-Governmental organization “Bridge to the future” where they got information about the project and about its details.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding as it was one of the main discussion topic during the activities and participants had opportunity to share their understanding and practical experiences about it.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it had sessions where, through a variety of non-formal educational tools such role playing and storytelling techniques, simulation exercises, workshops, the topics of human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue were addressed.

Aydan KARIMLI, NUR Children and Youth Public Union

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Aydan Karimli has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Training on Peacebuilding based on Human Rights education for students” from the 16th to 30th March in Azerbaijan.

The training course was organized for young people including participants with refugee and Internally Displaced Person(IDP) background. A group consisted of 10 young people, students of local universities aged 18-20, whom were trained on human rights and peace building. The participants were trained to follw-up in the promotion of human rights and peace building in their universities by conducting creative initiatives such as contests and art workshops debates among their peers. Such small activities had the attempt to have positive impact in the community and raise awareness about the importance of peace and intercultural dialogue.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and being human rights based, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based linked with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by bringing together young people to talk about the issues such as the peacebuilding process and aggression towards specific group of people. Moreover the project managed to create a small group of young people who were inspired to openly promote the ideas of peace together as a team in their universities, as well as through social media.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it create an opportunity to explore history and concepts of human rights and advocate for human rights by creating joint activities.

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Emil BALAVAC, Youth Club 'Under the Same Sun'

My project idea

The main project objective is to facilitate mutual understanding and cooperation of young people from the three major cities in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Sarajevo, Mostar, Brcko/Tuzla) through workshops which would build a feeling of joint ownership over the city. This is especially important for Bosnia and Herzegovina and the planned cities, which suffered a lot from the war in 90-s and still have image of the conflict points on the map of Europe. This conflict left painful wounds in their communities, creating distrust and distance, whose elimination is the focus of this project.

The project builds on the CoE youth sector priority “Living together in diverse societies: youth policy and youth work promoting intercultural dialogue”, since it aims to support youth work for peace-building and transformation and cooperation with the Youth Ambassador for Peace coming from Bosnia and Herzegovina, who will have a chance to act as a real peace ambassador during the workshops which he will facilitate.

The project will offer an opportunity to the youth of these cities to explore their joint heritage, define places which interconnect them and build an image of their city as a place which is dedicated to the peace building. Also, they will be asked to present their city to the public in an informative and interesting way, emphasizing what aspects make it multicultural.

The workshops will have a task to answer the next questions in general:

What is common for all ethnic/other communities in this city?

What from the past could be used to build joint future?

What places could be used for the mutual activities? How and why?

How could they contribute to the mutual understanding?

How would they present their city to the young person coming?

It is planned to organize 2 workshops in each city, involving at least 10 people. One workshop will gather young people aged 15-19 (high school), and other 20-26 (university). The results of the workshops will be published in the end of the project online in a form of a short booklet – a guide through these cities available to all young people in Europe. Also, it is planned to print 1.000 copies in BHS and English language, which will be distributed among international partners. The booklet will therefore put a stress to the multi-ethnic component of the cities, reflecting the important spots for each ethnic community and contributing to the better mutual understanding in the spirit of the concept of deep security.

The final phase of the project will include promotional campaign among young people in BiH which will be invited to contribute further to the results of the project through online editing and commenting. During the campaign, the booklet would be promoted online, especially through social media, where young people would have a chance to give their comments and suggest more actions, places or points of mutual interest in the participating cities. In this way, the project applies participatory approach including young people in each phase of the project. It would be also available online through the channels of European Youth Card as one of the first initiative of Auctus in the EYCA network.

My project idea

Together with another participant, we are planing to organise a project which will gather about 20 young people from "divided" cities in Bosnia Herzegovina, such are Mostar and Doboj. They will be together working on different topics concerning human rights, volunteering, active citizenship, and the possibility to work together, work in diversity. It will be a 7 days workshops, where will be specialised educators who will work with the youth, and after the youth will have to organise the local projects in their communities. At the end, our aim is to form youth organisations which will be multiethnical, and will be working in the future about similar topics.

Damjan JUGOVIC, Association of Secondary School Students in Bosnia and Herzegovina

My project idea

The aim is to educate and to gather Bosnian youth people who live in the same communities and have too much diversities which is preventing them to cooperate, to be friends and to have better mutual understandings.

This will be a project run by volunteers which focus will be on gathering youth with differences (religious, ethnic and political) sharing different opinions, breaking the prejudices and making new friendships, trough the non-formal education techniques and collaborative projects.

The most important needs are the following:

raising awareness that prejudices are the problem which is blocking Bosnian and Herzegovina road to the any integrations.

opportunities to interact with young people from diverse cultural and ethnical backgrounds;

wider range of accessible and enjoyable youth activities that would encourage social participation.

making new friendships, and promoting social dialogue.

Youth Ambassadors cooperation in the region!

In the organization of the Youth Education Committee of Serbia, in Belgrade from 3rd to 8th September was held a conference called „Youth Reconciliation Ambassadors“. 20 Young activists from Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo took part in this conference, which shares the ideas and the aims as the “Youth Peace Ambassadors” – Council of Europe.

Conference had the aims to strengthen the multi-perspective discussions concerning the topics of the cooperation of the ex-Yugoslav republics and the region. During the conference, four main topics were discussed: History and Human Rights, Human Rights and Conflicts, Europe and reality, and Ethnicity and Nationalism.

This Conference was a good opportunity to share the experiences, make new friendships, and hear the lectures of the eminent experts, politicians, activist… During the Conference participants visited many institutions starting from the Special court for organized and war crimes, Anticorruption agency, Agency for the protection of equality and ombudsman, NGO’s…

It was a great chance for all young people to talk to the high positioned officials in Serbia, prof. Milica Delevic (talking about European integrations of Serbia) and Mr. Žarko Kovač, member of the Serbian Parliament. At the end, British ambassador in Serbia, Mr. Majkl Davenport, closed the conference, and awarded the participants with the certificates and the medals of honor.

At this event, Damjan Jugovic, participant from the group A of the “Youth Peace Ambassadors”, took place and represented the project, and also, shared the idea of organizing the mutual conference of the regional Youth Ambassadors, in 2013.

From the participants it is expected to write a short essay about their views concerning the reconciliation process, and the best essays will be published in the book, which will be shared all around the Europe. Also, participants are expected to share their knowledge and skills in the upcoming months, and in 2013. It is planned to have another conference where will be discussed about the future activism of Youth Ambassadors.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Damjan Jugovic has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Regional Conference of Students Associations of FPN from ex Yugoslavia” from the 7thto 9th December 2012 in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The aim of the project was to promote students’ right and increase the quality and the experience of studying by gathering all associations of Students of Faculty of Political Sciences from the region and discussing about several topics concerning the students standard.

In the region students’ standards are low, as well as the universities are on the lower-level positions on the world rank lists. “SPONA” started this initiative with the aim to make a network of students unions and to establish a common platform of student’s rights in order to achieve better standards in the region and engage students in the creation of a solution for this issue.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by gathering students’ representatives from former Yugoslavia and plan further actions in cooperation.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it created a sharing environment for youngsters from different countries and the project itself focused on student’s rights, in particular for the integration and inclusion of minorities and disabled people in the educational systems.

Ratko SAVIC, Association of high-school students in Bosnia and Herzegovina

My project idea

Project title: Yesterday, today, tomorrow!

(Do not forget the yesterday, live today, think of tomorrow)

Project, which we want to implement, is supposed to last for 8 months. It is aimed to promote basic social values, which are considered to have been lost during decomposition of Yugoslavia. The new state, Bosnia and Herzegovina, where people of different nationalities lived together in peace, is now on the brink of conflict. Their reconciliation is a process that will take years, but what we want to do in this project is only a small beginning of reconciliation. Big problems of the state in general, and specially of our local community, Gradiska municipality, are unemployment, economical crises, high rate of nationalism, segregation, discrimination, wrong system of values, and similar. There is no development, and one of the main reasons for that is passivity and closed mind of society and people individually. As it is hard to make changes between older generations, focus of action to change is youth. Some actions and project were realized bud had no effect. Noticing mistakes and weaknesses of previous projects and considering social needs we want to develop a project based on non-formal education and practical constructive socially-useful work, for average youth and children, adapted for their need and adjusted to their age and state of mind in order to stimulate action and spreading of new ideas between, specially, youth and, generally, all citizens of our local community. Also, trough creation of a music video we want to promote European and modern values, and also to promote our municipality, to people all around Bosnia and Herzegovina and Europe. A group of youth that we have chosen to work is at the age when they start thinking about what is waiting for them, and they create a first opinion. The idea is that young people work with children. We have planned the project to develop in 3 main phases. During the first phase we plan to give non-formal education to 20 young people aged between 16 and 20 years from our municipality, in field of peace-building, human rights, tolerance and non-discrimination, intercultural and unity. Also they will be given adequate training to gain competences to moderate and lead creative workshops with younger population, particularly children aged between 4 and 8 years. Workshops with children will be implemented during the second phase and they are supposed to promote peace, tolerance, intercultural and human rights values between children in their early age of life. As a third phase of the project music video will be produced. The aim of the video is to promote Council of Europe values such as peace, unity and society of the same opportunities regardless of their religion and ethnicity. Also it is aimed to promote our municipality with its touristic values stressing its intercultural heritage. The project will be due to promotion of its slogan: "Do not forget yesterday, live today, think of tomorrow!"

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Ratko Savic has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow” from 09 to 16 of December 2012 in Mrakovica, Kozara mountain, in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The project aimed to have local impact in 12 Bosnia and Herzegovina’s communities and to promote social values and lasted five months.

It was organized a training seminar exploring the concepts of peacebuilding, human rights, tolerance and non-discrimination, intercultural dialogue and unity. The target group was 18 young people aged between 16 and 24 years from different cultural backgrounds and local communities in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

It was also organized, in a second step of the project, workshops to promote peace, tolerance, intercultural and human rights values with a group of children between the age of 10 and 12 years old.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project was community based as it had impact on the community by involving other actors and working closely with the younger generation.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by proving a learning opportunity for young people and future youth peace workers giving them the opportunity to be multipliers, and empowering them in order to take action.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as the essence of the project was human rights protection and human rights education awareness. The training seminar was based on intercultural approach, since all the participants were coming from different cultural backgrounds and given a safe environment where they were encouraged to interact with each other.

Ervin TOKIC

My project idea

Before the war, Trnovo was one town-municipality. It is located in the mountains close to Sarajevo. After the war it has been divided through the Daytoon agreement into Trnovo in Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Trnovo in the Republic of Srpska. The idea of the project is to bring together young people from both communities through a several months long project in which will be implemented peace building, conflict transformation and human rights education through joint trips, work-camp with final goal of young people from both communities establishing together a youth NGO. I will organise monthly meetings of young people from both Trnovo in Republic of Srpska and Trnovo in Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. On meetings young people from both municipalities of Trnovo would get to know each other, discuss about their needs and watch short documentary movies on human rights and later discuss about it. The final step in the project would be a work-camp where young people would spend three days in homes of their friends in Trnovo in Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and three days in Trnovo in Republic of Srpska working on the issues which are most needed by the local community.

The project is needed because young people from both communities need to establish intercultural dialogue, identify which human rights they lack in their communities, break stereotypes and prejudices about young people from other community. Will also allow young people to spend their free time in more creative way!

My initiatives for peace-building

I organised several workshops with the goal of beginning of implementation of the programme ''One World in Schools'' in high schools in Bosnia and Herzegovina. On 17th and 18th of September 2011 in Sarajevo, ''Pravo Ljudski'' together in cooperation with NGO ''People In Need'' from Prague organized a workshop for 18 high school professors coming from 10 different cities in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

''One world in Schools'' programme is currently used in more than 2800 primary and high schools in Czech Republic and as well in Slovakia, Poland, Estonia, Romania, Sweden, Germany, and Lebanon among others.
The objective of the programme is to educate pupils and secondary school students about topicalissues in today’s world by using screenings of documentary films and other audiovisual resources,follow-up discussions, accompanying publications and interactive methods.
Work-shop was held by the expertise team from ''People In Need'' with the assistance of the trainers from ''Pravo Ljudski''. I was one of the trainers from ''Pravo Ljudski''
In next months are planned more work-shops for high school professors from Bosnia and Herzegovina and as well publication of a methodical handbook (film synopses, questions & answers, information on the issues that the films are devoted to, activities and worksheets, advice and recommendations for using audiovisual materials in lessons) on Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian for high school professors in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Below you can find attached several photos from the work-shop, photos made by Olja Latinovic.

Croatia

Raminta BAGDONAITE, Brave Phone

My project idea

Every community is different with its needs and problems. Our community is nationalistic (Croatian, Bosnian, Serbian, Albanian, Romanian people) and also more religious part of Zagreb. Organization “Brave Phone” has the program which aims to encourage positive self-expression, self-actualization and self-esteem in children, as well as to develop and encourage certain skills, such as communication skills, non-violent problem, conflict solving and so forth. Volunteers have the main role in implementing these workshops. Their creativity, new ideas, honest and warm approach to children is one of the most important characteristic in working upon these workshops. All of our volunteers are students, young people who don’t have enough skills, knowledge and attitudes to deal with conflicts bulling, bad talks and violence in effective way between children with other nationalities.

Therefore we aim to empower the human rights, conflict solving, anti-discrimination, anti-racism, creativity and leadership potential of the volunteers in “Brave Phone” organization. This session of the training courses will use at maximum the creativity skills of the participants and will reinforce human rights learning and mutual understanding, aiming solidarity and intercultural dialogue using accelerated learning and non formal methods as tools. In 3 training courses by exchanging their experiences and keeping in contact 40 participants from “Brave Phone” organization will improve communication skills and they will increase their level of knowledge, will get rid of motiveless stereotypes and phobias, and will enlarge the horizon of the human and supply much more knowledge by learning the human rights. We aim to help people to meet, find and know ourselves without any fear and it see other with the respect. After training course we expect participants to have more competences in working with bulling problem in effective way and to come up with ideas for future projects and workshops involving local community, especially children with different nationalities which will bring the concept of conflicts prevent intercommunity corporation and delivering the certificate of this training course session.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Raminta Bagdonaite has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled "Father's guitar'13" from 31st May to 1st July 2013 in Rokiskis, Lithunia.

“Father’s guitar’13” was an international intercultural music festival which highlighted the exchange of different ideas, opinions and cultures orzanized in cooperation with the Regional Union of Youth Organizations “Apvalus Stalas.

The aim of the project was to encourage peaceful coexistence, settle scores through dialogue and get to know other’s cultures and way of life in order to tackle stereotypes and conflicts and increase youth’s participation in activities concerning cultural, political and social questions. The project brought together 100 youngsters between musicians, volunteers, non-profit organizations members from different countries and backgrounds. Indirect beneficiaries were around 3000 young people from the local community, who participated in the discussions, various workshops, living library and other activities.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by bringing together around 3000 young people from Rokiskis community and foreign countries and giving them the space to discuss, talk, participate in activities as living library or musical workshops and spend time together in dignity, happiness and peace.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it highlighted human rights’ importance, and gave the opportunity to exchange of different ideas, opinions and cultures. Music was chosen as a method of communication and learning as music is the universal language of the mankind and is indeed an essential part of the culture. Moreover, music has the power to break down boundaries between people therefore people were more united in becoming more sensitive to each other’s cultures, traditions, and practices.

France

Karen Namain PONG, Youth Against Human Trafficking in Europe - YAHTE

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Karen Pong has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “YHT: How Students Can Get Involved in Prevention” a conference held on 11th April 2013 in Paris, France.

The first phase of the project therefore consisted of the Youth against Human Trafficking conference, which was expected to raise awareness and promote intercultural dialogue, with emphasis on the promotion of youth participation in human trafficking prevention.

The project had up to 40 direct beneficiaries including peer educators, active volunteers, consultants and assistants. Moreover, at least 150 indirect beneficiaries in the project including those who attended the conference, especially those who participated in the survey and those who were exposed to the project, whether through posters on campus, on Facebook or by word of mouth.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by promoting intercultural dialogue and developing constructive attitudes in a human rights framework.
The project was Community based as it has impact on the local community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by promoting a culture of peace whereby human dignity is indispensable and encourages the reflection of human rights violations.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it gives a learning opportunity on human rights promotion and protection; moreover the background of the project was rich and ensured an intercultural environment.

Georgia

Nino TSULAIA, Our Generation for Future

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Nino Tsulaia has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Your Rights Belong to You” from the 25th to 29th December 2012 in Tbilisi, Georgia.

The main aim of the project was providing educational opportunities for internally displaced young people of Georgia, direct from South Ossetia and Abkhazia, on Human Rights. The project was based on Council of Europe Charter on Education for Democratic Citizenship and Human Rights Education and Compass -a manual for human rights education with young people. In the frame of the project it was held a training course on human rights education, in which young people had possibility to become familiar with Georgia’s local law related to Internally Displaced People (IDP). Project’s target group were young people from IDP communities of Georgia aged 18-25, for a total 20 youngsters in which the balance was of 10 people from South Ossetia and 10 from Abkhazia. There were follow up activities in State University in Tbilisi, in IDP districts in Tserovani (Georgia), and also a short documentary video on human rights involving the participants of the training course.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by proving a safe environment for the participants to share experiences and views and to enable them to create partnerships for future collaborations and activities based on on human rights, peace and democracy.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection as the training was based on Compass, Council of Europe Charter on Education and Georgia’s law related to IDPs; moreover the project addressed intercultural dialogue as one of the focal point of the training course by bringing participants with different backgrounds.

Kekoshvili VAKHTANG, Coalition For IDP's Rights

My project idea

Football is more than just sport!

I will organise during two weeks activities dedicated to human rights education (respect, tolerance, equality …). One week workshop will be dedicated for Human rights and the rules of this particular football based approach, and another one will be football playing. We will made mixed teams, considering, gender, ethnic, and ability. This football forum will be open and will be for all young people of this concrete settlment.

My initiatives for peace-building

In summer I was involved in two projects. To be more concrete one project was held from 15 of July till 30 of July 20011 in Italy. The name of the project was “Building Bridges “and the concept was peace. It was held in most peace full place in the world , “Rondine itadelaa de la pache” Toscana Italy. In this place there are living students from conflict affected territories, for e.g Russian, Bosnian, Chechen, Serbian, Georgian, Armenian, Azerbaijani and so on, almost all representatives of all over the conflict affected regions in the world. I was participant of this vary interesting project. In the frame of the project we were trained in Human Rights, got to now communication tool, received useful course on Journalistic writing .
Second project inside “Georgian Dances “ was held by me. Location of the project was Georgia, project was lasted from 5 of August till 5 of September. Participant were ethnic Georgians, youth range from 14 to 18 years old, 42 young people were trained in Georgian national dances and at the same time during working hours they received training on Human rights, Democracy, Rule of law. Georgian national dance have been used as a tool .

Germany

Alexandra Maria HUBER, Anne Frank Zentrum

My project idea

On the 12th of June 1942 Anne Frank got a diary as a birthday present. This diary has become a document of world’s history. This year is the 70th-anniversary of Anne’s diary and we plan to use this date as a commemoration day for her history and the cruelty of the Nazi-regime as well as a day that gives young students the chance to learn something about discrimination today and how to work against it. We plan to work with students from a high school (ca. 15-16 years old). The project will imply history as well as creativity. In May, four workshops (one per week) will be offered to the students. These workshops will give them the chance to grabble with themes Anne also had to deal with. They will be base on quotes of Anne.

The possible themes are:

Racism

Civil courage

Anti-Semitism

Right-wing-extremism / nationalism

Sexism

The second part of the project promotes creativity as a way of dealing with today’s problems. The students will be able to use what they have learned in the other workshops in a creative way. We plan three workshops. One is about poetry slam and the participants will be trained by a poetry slammer and learn how to use language as a »weapon« against racism. The second one is a workshop that will change the streets of the »Kiez«(=city quarter of Berlin) of the students. We plan to use graffiti work in the streets to show Anne’s quotes and make the peasants think. The last workshop is about photography and how to present human rights in a creative way.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Alexandra Huberhas implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Encouraging young people to show civil courage in a creative way” in July 2012 in Berlin, Germany.

The project was organized on 70th anniversary of Anne Frank’s diary to remind young people of the importance of engage in the process of peacebuilding and support the commemoration of Anne Frank’s civil courage.

The project took place for one week in a school in Berlin, with a target group of students of 7th grade facilitated by Berlin’s photography university. The pupils were helped to develop creative pictures in order to enabling them to express and share their ideas on the topic of civil courage.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by enabling students to have a space where they would be able to discuss about peace.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it deepened the topics during creative activities and discussions.

Greece

George Leonard CHRISTODOULOU, Athina SOS

My project idea

Project title: LifeSKaterz

The project will have young unemployed and underemployed people offering voluntary work and the opportunity to participate in Sports because young unemployed people left university and have been left without any “reference point”. They stay at home having no money to spend and they are separated from their friends and people they know. They do not participate in the community life either and they cannot do any of their interests again as a result of their financial situation. They are prone to extreme and hate politics to blame others. This project aims to re-activate young people and also offer them a scope and also the opportunity to meet new people. They can also overcome their stereotypes about others

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Leonard Christodoulouhas implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Lifeskaterz” from May 2012 to March 2013.

The project “Lifeskaterz” has the following objectives:

to re-enact and include unemployed and underemployed young people in the community;
to fight stereotypes regarding young people, immigrants and refugees;
to promote artistic creation and sports participation as an answer to social and economic issues.

As result of the economic situation and level of unemployment, increasingly young people become socially alienated and they do no participate in community life. Thus, the idea of the project was to have young people participating in community life in interaction with other young people, immigrants and organisations. The initial idea has been to target up to 200 people who could work as multipliers.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by [Q14 column Q from sheet “detailed” of “Project description 33.xls” form of the platform].

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it participant too part actively in human rights promotion in a space with people from different social, ethnic and religious groups.

Hungary

Luca ELEK, Útilapu - SCI Hungary

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Luca Elek has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Minorities through Education”, from 28th July to 4th August 2012 in Budapest, Hungary.

The project “Minorities through Education" was an international training course based on non-formal education and experiential learning aiming to develop educational material for youth about minorities in order to enhance understanding and tolerance. Youth workers from different areas of Europe (Hungary, Turkey, Georgia, Russia, Sweden, FROM, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Armenia, Cyprus, Kosovo, Italy and Romania) were invited in order to have a wide overview of different minority issues and different educational practices.

They discussed how minorities appear in formal and informal education presenting their own realities and the minority issues of each participating country.

Participants discussed about the main goal of the educational material by comparing the different information they receive from formal education and media. The second part of the training presented a series of best practices of different organizations working on this topic. Afterwards, participants created a workshop which consisted from different parts aiming to cover the following topics:

basic knowledge about human rights and minorities;

making youth minority sensitive;

motivating youth to take action and speak up against discrimination.

During the training an online blog was created where all the material was available to everyone with the possibility of sharing feedbacks on how they work in practice. Such a tool aims to help youth workers and educators to raise awareness of minority issues and by that weaken stereotypes and xenophobia.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by aiming to promote minority rights, coexistence and diversity in the communities. Trying to point out not to fear who is different and instead the way that differences make society richer and more beautiful. Some of the participants were from the minority groups living in the participating countries. By doing so, project brought together people from every part of the society and gave the opportunity to learning by experiencing. All those mentioned above are concrete steps in order to reach a peaceful community.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as the participants of the training course were coming from 12 different countries and 24 different backgrounds. They were building the cultural understanding from the very beginning of the project through the team building activities, intercultural night, presentations of their realities, of the situation of the minorities in their countries, group work, and alternative trip (Roma study visit) in Budapest. During mentioned above activities the participants were able to find the differences and common points with the others; exchange views; know various cultures and understand that they could differ but all are of a great value. Moreover the project aimed to promote the tolerance, common understanding and curiosity about the minorities and not only. The importance of building bridges among the cultures and appreciating the diversity in the societies was emphasized during many activities. By the activities during which the participants were able to feel to empathy towards socially excluded groups, make them understand that all people are equal and that the human rights of none could be violated. During some activities the participants could understood the need and possibilities of taking action in order to raise awareness on human rights, human rights violations and to defend inter alia human rights of minorities. The multiplication of gained knowledge and actions taken by the “students” of participants is expected to happen during the implementation of the extra-curricular material.

Zlata KHARITONOVA, Minority Rights Group International

My project idea

The idea is to conduct a number of activities aiming to combat racism and xenophobia in the capital of Hungary with the involvement of the international student community.

There is a need to change the general hostile perception of the foreigners in Hungary, to oppose the raise of radical nationalism and xenophobic attitudes.

The objectives of the project is to raise awareness of the existing problem among the population, stimulate the youth to take part in combating negative sides of nationalism, create a more friendly and safe situation in “the big city”, namely Budapest.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Zlata Kharitonovahas implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Human rights activism for university students” from September to December 2013 in Budapest, Hungary.

The aim of the “Human Rights Activism For the University Students” was to provide tools for university students to fight human rights violations through campaigns and events such as round-table discussions and theatre performances; also raising awareness about human rights using social networks and multimedia tools. The facilitators of the project provided several case studies from the Human RightS Initiative (HRSI) experience, an organization which deals with social engagement and capacity building. Another goal of the project was also to train peer educators who can address different range of problems, from Roma issues to environmental situation, from gender-related questions to xenophobia and racism.
The target group of the project was university students, as it is their responsibility to make positive changes in the communities and they should be able to think critically and response to the challenges of their communities accordingly.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by involving other actors.

The project was implemented at the beginning of the academic year 2013-2014.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it introduces of techniques for human rights related activities and encouraging discussion on the matter.

Bernadett Mária VARGA, ROMED

My project idea

This project aims to open the discussion and to close the gap between Roma and non-Roma towards a better understanding. I would like to achieve that the non-Roma teenagers think about diversity and to awake their empathy understanding why the Roma behave and live the way they do. It should not only be raising awareness of discrimination, but it should create a link between the parties, so that they will not hate each other based on ethnical background.

The main problem is that teenagers usually don’t have any knowledge about the Roma, except for what they see via the media or what they hear at home from their parents. As racism and discrimination towards the Roma is high in Hungary, it is very important that those children don’t only receive information about gypsies through the ways mentioned above, but also from an external channel, where they can ask their questions if they have.

As a consequence of the above problems, there is a huge gap between Roma and non-Roma young adults and so they bring this attitude with themselves also into their adulthoods. With this open discussion opportunity, they might have the chance to ask their questions, and to have another perspective about gypsies. Hearing about them from an external channel and seeing positive examples with their own eyes might widen their spectrum and open their minds for diversity. The discussion will be focused on Roma and will be presented by Roma youngsters as well. At least 16 high-school classes will take part in the project before summer-holiday starts. This means 15-25 students per each classes. If the project runs successfully, it will continue in other schools from September. In the meantime, during the summertime I am planning to visit some camps, organized for gispy or non-gipsy students with the same purpose.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Bernadette Varga has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Let’s talk about the Gypsies!” from January 2012 to May 2013 held in Budapest, Hungary.

During the project was held in secondary and high school classes and aimed to tackle the racism and discrimination towards the Roma community in Hungary and break the stereotypes on Roma.

With this open discussion opportunity, 40 pupils from two different schools had the chance to ask their questions and to learn a perspective about gypsies which differs from the biased-media prospective.

These schools are located in Budapest.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by promoting intercultural dialogue, developing constructive attitudes and including human rights and non-The project was also Community based as it linked with other actors and existing initiatives.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding and intercultural dialogue by offering to the pupils a learning space to foster tolerance and respect towards each other different communities.

Italy

Marco TURRINI, Associazione Sud

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Marco Turrini has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Cinema. Tra Dialogo e Conflitto” held in Italy from January 2014 to October 2014.

The project had as goal to reach 450 students between 14 and 17 years old coming from different regional contexts (Trentino and Emilia-Romagna) and aimed to raise awareness about the patterns of conflict, as example the one between Israelis and Palestinians, and explore the concept of forgiveness and its importance. Reputedly, activities will occur from January 2014 to June 2014. After the summer, students will be invited to take part to the 2014 Religion Today Film Festival in Trento, in which they will have the opportunity to meet guests of different nationalities and religions and live a real multicultural dialogue experience.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by experiencing peacebuilding education through various lessons about conflicts and discussions with other peers.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it provided a training course on conflict management

Kosovo

Alban KRYEZIU, NGO ZANA

My project idea

In Peja Region, in Kosovo, there are different community groups of young people such as : Albanians, Serbiana, Bosnians, RAE. The relation between them is not so good, they need more support in order to build their bridge of understanding.

My project is based on training courses in 4 municipal levels. We will select most active participants from different community groups and prepare joint activities with young people locally.

My project is called Local Change Makers. It is a project that aims to raise awearness of young people of Peja/Pec Region regarding human rights education and peace. Communities in this region have a need to get involved in peace building activities and human rights trainings which will help them to be aware and build new vision towards tolerance and inter-ethnic dialogue.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Alban Kryeziu has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Regional Youth Peace Camp Kosovo 2013” from 13th to 20th September 2013 in Kosovo.

The aim of the Regional Youth Peace Camp in Kosovo was to engage young people and youth organizations from different communities in Kosovo and different countries in the Balkan region in dialogue and conflict transformation activities based on human rights education and intercultural learning and to provide them with a positive experience in living and learning together.

The project involved 25 participants between 18 and 25 years old with a team staff of 7 people.

develop the conceptual and practical meanings of conflict, peace, and conflict transformation and share among participants their personal experiences of conflict and violence and their coping strategies, identifying commonalities and specificities between them;

develop the competences of participants in conflict transformation and intercultural learning, including a critical understanding of the personal and collective identities and their role in armed conflicts;

learn about human rights and human rights education as frameworks for conflict transformation and dialogue;

learn from existing practices and experiences of people within the youth field working on dialogue and conflict transformation;

motivate and support participants in their role as multipliers and peer leaders in peace-building activities with young people from their organizations and communities.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by exploring concepts of conflict transformation, learning about peace and being peace promoters. Moreover the participant sent messages for International day of Peace on 21st September on No Hate Speech Movement campaign web site.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as they were explored in one entire day during the project in order to be multipliers.

Lithuania

Deimante NARIJAUSKAITE, CISV Lithuania

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Deimante Narijauskaite has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Children Talk Vilnius” from the 4thNovember 2012 to 1st February 2013 in Vilnius, Lithuania.

The aim of “Children Talk Vilnius” was to encourage the cooperation between two nations, Lithuanians and Lithuanian Polish in order to live peacefully in one city - Vilnius. There were three working groups of four Lithuanians and four Polish supported by three volunteers in each group. The volunteers acted as facilitators to addressed different problems the city of Vilnius was facing and together developed solutions for them. Thus, the project involved young participants who not only participated in activities, also implemented their own small projects.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by proving an opportunity for different groups of youngsters to cooperate with each other focusing on a common aim, leaving aside conflicts.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it brought youngster from two different nationalities and provided them with a safe environment for discussions in order to break prejudices and tackle discrimination.

Nigeria

Gil Ibrahim JULIUS, Nigerian community Vinnitsa

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Gil Ibrahim Julius has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Youth peace ambassadors International soccer tournament” from 14th to 27thMay 2012 in Ukraine.

The project was a sportive event which brought various nationalities together to discuss their various concerns as regards each other and challenge stereotypes and by encouraging peaceful coexistence. In a first step of the project, a seminar for the leaders of various communities was held on Intercultural dialogue and its role for a peaceful coexistence.

The final aim of the project was to empower the participants in order to enable them to be become multipliers in their communities by bringing the youth together through sports, especially soccer.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by bringing people with different background together and challenging stereotypes and prejudices.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it give a learning opportunity for the communities to get to know each other and their human rights, especially for the minority groups.

Northern Ireland

Corrine HEANEY, Save the Children

My project idea

When researching the human rights at stake in my community I tried to focus on issues relating to the basic needs of children and young people. The five themes I focused on were standard of living/poverty, health and wellbeing, housing, education and segregation, in each of the examples, the legacy of the conflict was clearly evident. I believe these issues can be grouped under the problem of social exclusion.

Following the conflict, social exclusion is an important issue that needs to be addressed in Northern Ireland, it particularly impacts on the opportunities of young people. My projects wants to work with young people to support them as active and equal citizens. The project will see young people from four organisations sharing experiences and learning together about democracy, human rights and citizenship. Each organisation will bring its skills providing training and/or peer education on community action projects/campaigning, youth arts, social media and youth democracy. The project will start in the beginning of 2012 and be run in cooperation with my organisation, local government and other youth organisations.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Corrine Heaney has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Save the Children Ambassadors: Addressing social exclusion for peace” from January to September 2013 in Northern Ireland, United Kingdom.

The aim of the project was to address social exclusion of young people through human rights education and peace building. It involved 20 young people from two cities in Northern Ireland which had communities suffering from the highest levels of child poverty and disadvantage.

Across the length of the project, young people came together to develop competences through training and peer-education to address social exclusion and build peace in communities. Their activities provided them with experience of campaigns, lobbying, and accountability within a human rights framework.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by bringing together young people from segregated and disadvantaged communities and providing them with the skills and training to work together on issues and campaign for a better future.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it tackles human rights violations such as poverity.

Poland

Agata STAJER, Amnesty International

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Agata Stajer has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Minorities through Education”, from 28th July to 4th August 2012 in Budapest, Hungary.

The project “Minorities through Education" was an international training course based on non-formal education and experiential learning aiming to develop educational material for youth about minorities in order to enhance understanding and tolerance. Youth workers from different areas of Europe (Hungary, Turkey, Georgia, Russia, Sweden, FROM, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Armenia, Cyprus, Kosovo, Italy and Romania) were invited in order to have a wide overview of different minority issues and different educational practices.

They discussed how minorities appear in formal and informal education presenting their own realities and the minority issues of each participating country.

Participants discussed about the main goal of the educational material by comparing the different information they receive from formal education and media. The second part of the training presented a series of best practices of different organizations working on this topic. Afterwards, participants created a workshop which consisted from different parts aiming to cover the following topics:

basic knowledge about human rights and minorities;

making youth minority sensitive;

motivating youth to take action and speak up against discrimination.

During the training an online blog was created where all the material was available to everyone with the possibility of sharing feedbacks on how they work in practice. Such a tool aims to help youth workers and educators to raise awareness of minority issues and by that weaken stereotypes and xenophobia.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by aiming to promote minority rights, coexistence and diversity in the communities. Trying to point out not to fear who is different and instead the way that differences make society richer and more beautiful. Some of the participants were from the minority groups living in the participating countries. By doing so, project brought together people from every part of the society and gave the opportunity to learning by experiencing. All those mentioned above are concrete steps in order to reach a peaceful community.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as the participants of the training course were coming from 12 different countries and 24 different backgrounds. They were building the cultural understanding from the very beginning of the project through the team building activities, intercultural night, presentations of their realities, of the situation of the minorities in their countries, group work, and alternative trip (Roma study visit) in Budapest. During mentioned above activities the participants were able to find the differences and common points with the others; exchange views; know various cultures and understand that they could differ but all are of a great value. Moreover the project aimed to promote the tolerance, common understanding and curiosity about the minorities and not only. The importance of building bridges among the cultures and appreciating the diversity in the societies was emphasized during many activities. By the activities during which the participants were able to feel to empathy towards socially excluded groups, make them understand that all people are equal and that the human rights of none could be violated. During some activities the participants could understood the need and possibilities of taking action in order to raise awareness on human rights, human rights violations and to defend inter alia human rights of minorities. The multiplication of gained knowledge and actions taken by the “students” of participants is expected to happen during the implementation of the extra-curricular material.

Russian Federation

Bekkhan GELGOEV, RPO SCI "Youth for future

My project consists of organising training activities for peace-building and Human rights Education in conflict affected communities.The project aim is to engage young people and youth leaders from conflict affected communities in Georgia and Czeczenia to train them as trainers of Human rights and develop their skills in using forum theatre as a tool to foster intercultural communication and peace-building.

Since 2008, since the Russian-Georgian conflict, relations between the people inhabiting these countries have become negative in the power of advocacy by the two governments - the Russian and Georgian. People have formed negative relationship to each other, have developed stereotypes of each other. The project proposes a training course to train Human Rights’ trainers to spread the knowledge of Human rights and peace-building idea to schools and public through using various methods as e.g:. forum theatre.

The project is necessary for the development of intercultural dialogue and raising awareness on Human Rights between Russian and Georgian youth. The project is also required for skill acquisition techniques in local communities of participants involved.

Varvara KONEVA, Great Baikal Trail

My project idea

The aim is to educate Siberian youth as environmentally-friendly and socially responsible group of people able to bring peace, sustainability and intercultural co-operation to the local community. My project is a long-term project run by volunteers entirely which would focus on environmental and human rights education to bring sustainability, social reconciliation and intercultural dialogue through non-formal education techniques and collaborative projects (environmental, cultural and human-rights based).

The most important needs to which the project responds are the following:

opportunities to interact with young people from diverse cultural and ethnical backgrounds;

wider range of accessible and enjoyable youth activities that would encourage social participation.

Some problems that young people in the local community face could also be the reasons why the project is necessary, e.g. the dissatisfying environmental conditions, dysfunction of the local youth community due to the lack of communication between various groups of young people, xenophobia, social exclusion and a growing negative attitude towards Eastern Siberia as a place of permanent residence.

My initiatives for peace-building

The 19th of May, 2011 became the day when the students and NGO volunteers in Siberian city of Irkutsk discovered a brand new way of communication. Seventeen people aged 18-27 took part in the training called “Human Rights and Intercultural Education” organized at Irkutsk State Linguistic University with the help of Great Baikal Trail and Youth Peace Ambassadors project.

The training was divided in two sections – theoretical and practical – and included interactive presentations, exercises and games devoted to the basics of human rights education, social and intercultural education, problems of discrimination and xenophobia. All the participants found the presented concepts both new and topical and expressed their willingness to contribute to the YPA initiatives. The surprising thing was that although all the participants had had an experience of volunteering for projects connected with young people and children in conflict-affected communities, none of them had ever viewed the problems from the perspective of human rights violations as the human rights movement has just started developing in this part of Russia.
The training became the first event of its kind in Irkutsk and helped not only to promote human rights education but also gave an example of the non-formal education approach and emphasized the importance of activism in the youth work.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Varya Koneva has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Youth Centre for Environmental Education and Human Rights” from 15th September 2012 to 15th June 2013, on the city of Irkutsk, Russia.

“Youth Centre for Environmental Education and Human Rights” was an initiative to feature human rights and environmental education in Siberia through series of study sessions for local children by young volunteers.

The aim of the project was to educate Siberian youth to raise both environmental and human rights education awareness of Siberian youth through a series of educational activities, such as the Living Library, and motivate youngster to advocate for human rights.

Moreover, the project aimed to create a network of youth leaders in Siberia willing to contribute to the social and environmental improvements, while promoting the idea of volunteerism, sustainable development, human equality, and peace in the region.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by giving to the youth the learning opportunity to analyse the current situation in the local community and challenge the existing conflicts and stereotypes running educational activities with focus on peacebuilging.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as the project’s educational activities, using the non-formal learning methodology, addressed dialogue and empathy.

Elena ZHIRUKHINA, Youth Club 'Social Diplomacy'

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Elena Zhirukhina has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Human rights issue in the North Caucasus within the CoE–Russia relation” during 2013 in Rostov-on-Don, Russia.

The project aimed to create a report which addresses to the human rights violations in the North Caucasus, which continue taking place in the region, and to the international mechanisms dealing with monitoring and protection of human rights.
The report, within the framework of annual research projects, had as a principal objective to analyse the bilateral relations between the Russian Federation and the Council of Europe within the specific topic of human rights protection.

The report explored the specificity of human rights in the North Caucasus and the implementation of international mechanisms for human rights protection: special attention was dedicated, thus, to the European Court of Human Rights’ efficiency and applicability in the North Caucasus, and also to the analysis of the legal assistance for the Court’s applications and the interoperability issues between human rights organizations and government structures, especially in the context of the new Russian legislation on NGOs.

The target group of the project were young researchers and young people, while the direct beneficiaries of the project were young researchers and students.

The project was a Youth project which aimed to address conflict transformation by developing constructive attitudes through human rights knowledge; it was also community based, as it offered to the community a report with the local human right’s situation and two maps.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by providing young people with research-based materials about the situation in the North Caucasus, which allows youth to take informed actions to improve the situation and be more effective in their initiatives.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it explored human rights protection in the local area and the implementation of the Council of Europe Human Rights conventions and application of court rulings.

Serbia

Ana DULOVIC, Association des Etats Generaux des Etudiants de l'Europe

My project idea

Project title: “Speak Up!”

Throughout the project which involves two months work with 30 young boys and girls from Roma community and children from rural areas surrounding Niš participants will have the opportunity to gain knowledge about human rights, to meet Commissioner for Protection of Equality, gain confidence and to be included in foreign language courses. They will use their creativity to pass on gained knowledge to their peers with creative workshops they will organize in their high schools, and in that way be involved in the process of strengthening of intercultural tolerance and understanding of the development of awareness among youth about accepting differences and respecting human rights, especially the rights of disadvantaged groups.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Ana Dulović has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Speak up!” from 18th to 21st October 2012 and from November to December 2012 in Niš, Serbia.

This project had as objective to reduce the high level of discrimination and violence between young people in the community of Nis and strengthen the capacities of young people for living in harmony with the intercultural values and the active promotion of the same.

“Speak up!” aimed to contribute to peace-building process by raising awareness about human rights, discrimination, conflicts and conflict resolution among the secondary school youth in the city of Niš, Serbia. The project was composed by a four-day camp training activities and two-months peer education - workshops in secondary schools.
“Speak up!” camp brought together a group of 25 young people, from 16 to 18 years of age, including youth members of the Roma community and children with special needs. In addition to this group there were also two Non-Governmental organizations’ activists, between the ages of 18 and 25, with the role of camp trainers’ assistants and two professors from secondary schools.

“Speak up!” camp was organized from 18th to 21st October 2012 and as a result had a group of 25 participants empowered to be peer educators. With support from their trainers, trainers’ assistants and project organizers, participants gained knowledge, skills and attitudes to being peer educators. Moreover, there were implemented workshops in the period from November to December, 2012, when more than 150 high school students from 5 secondary schools in Nis attended workshops on human rights’ issues, discrimination and conflict resolution. Each group of secondary school participants attended two workshops, one was about human rights and the other one was about conflicts. The results of the project were presented to the school representatives and other Non-Governmental organizations which deal with young people with the aim of creating a platform for further cooperation.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by raising awareness of human rights, various types of discrimination, conflicts and non-violent conflict resolution;’ “Speak up!” project also encouraged peace, intercultural learning and mutual aid in a spirit of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it had a diverse mix of participants, which helped having a lively and rewarding dialogue. The dialogue allowed the participants to build new relationships and networks and come up with innovative ideas. Participant as well created as follow up four different workshops on the topics of human rights, discrimination and conflict resolution.

Marija LUKIC, Instituto de la Paz y los Conflictos

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Marija Lukic has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Canolich Music Andorra: festival de la música cristiana” from 31stMay to 2nd June 2013 in Andorra.

The project aimed to bring together young people from different religious and geographical background and create an interreligious and intercultural dialogue between them.

The event gathered young people with Christian background from parishes, religious schools, movements and NGOs from Catalonya (Spain) and France. Moreover, it was present a Serbian group to make the interreligious dialogue richer and raising awareness about different communities and religions.

The dialogue was fostered through educational activities before and after musical performances, which were focus moments of the event as they had lyrics focusing on the target issues such as faith and religion.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by giving safe space to share different realities among different religious communities and involving marginalized people.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it was focusing specifically on interreligious dialogue by promoting the concepts of freedom of expression, active participation, equality and tolerance.

Spain

Edo SADIKOVIC, JUMP organization

My project idea

In the last two years, streets of Prijepolje, multicultural town in Serbia, became surrounded by “wrong” graffiti, filled with hate speech to opposite nationality (Muslim and Orthodox). Most of graffiti are written by boys from 2 different hooligan groups.

Idea of the project is to bring together 10 boys aged from 14 - 18, from 2 different hooligan and nationality groups who will redecorate town hate graffiti and be part of peace-building documentary. Most of those graffiti are done thanks to bad propaganda, without crucial understanding of politics or reasons of hate. This project will help to create strong peace-building base, mutual understanding and tolerance.

Project will hit into root of the problem, with great impact on graffiti “artists”. During the project, all graffiti will keep same shape and words, and they will be only redecorated in peace manner, by adding funny quotes, rearranging or adding peace symbols which will send good massage and leave nice street art gift to the city. Whole project and actions will be recorded, and video will be presented in alternative festival in Belgrade.

Project will last 2 months and will include staff from Jump organization and professional cameraman.

Sweden

Anna ANDREYEVA, MyChoice

My project idea

The project „Music and Peace without Borders“ is aimed at promoting the role of young musicians in peace-building activities that contribute to living together in dignity and dialogue, spreading of democatic values on international level. We will organise first an international youth event.The project will contribute to intercultural dialogue, sharing of experiences and collaborative learning.This will include an international activity as well as follow-up activities on the local level after the youth event. The project wants to create bridges for peace between musicians and youth leaders.

Hanna GYNNERSTEDT, CISV UK/ CISV Sweden

My project idea

In the multicultural community around London, there is a lack of conversation and interaction between diverse groups in society. The Lack of dialogue and direct contact between these groups and individuals are currently shaping the minds of the youth. Misconceptions and prejudges about youth from other backgrounds are not being contested and youth behave xenophobic and scared of interaction outside the specific own community. A lack of respect for other individuals makes me realize how a message of seeing the individual instead of the culture or faith is of immense importance. If young people can have fun, discuss and have activities with a diverse group of other young people living in the same area of London, it is a start to create multicultural relations and dialogue.

Therefore I wish to Empower and strengthen at least 50 girls and boys in the age of 15‐18 from both minority and majority religions and cultures in London. I wish for the youth to get a platform where they can meet other young people in a safe and neutral environment where they can feel comfortable to get new friends and just have fun. By creating a friendly environment and relations between these young people it will be a starting point for a multicultural network, promoting openness and becoming less xenophobic. I wish to arrange and lead activities with a network of other youth in the ages 20-26 that will be called the “role‐models”. The aim is for the young participants to be able to identify with older youth working within organisations that promote diversity and intercultural dialogue and at the same time see the other youth as individuals behind the culture, race or faith instead of stereotyping. I believe that once you start to see the individual as a friend and understand how every person has a story and more to them than what you first may think, it will create a mind-set of curiosity and less quick judgments.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Hanna Gynnerstedt has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Faces of London” from March to May 2013 in London, United Kingdom.

The aim of the project was to bring young people in the same local area together to create a interreligious dialogue and dispel stereotypes. The project brought 20 university students together through 5 study sessions on different topics, such as identity, intercultural learning, human right and social action. In addition, it was held as well a workshop about the multiplying effect and evaluation.

Creating a friendly environment and relations between young people from all different backgrounds and faiths was an important starting point for the creation of a multicultural network.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by creating a platform where young people were able to come together from segregated communities and share several issues. Participants felt strengthened by feeling a sense of belonging in the culturally diverse group and by having the chance to ask and discuss about unspoken concerns.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it deepened the knowledge on human rights and intercultural dialogue during sessions and discussions.

The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia

Natasha JANCHEVA, Mladiinfo/FEJS MK

My project idea

Macedonia, as a highly diverse and culturally-rich society, has faced many challenges in securing peaceful co-existence and communication between the various ethnic groups. This project aims at enhancing the intercultural dialogue and the familiarity of young people with human rights and peace-building through four different activities. At the beginning of August 2012, there will be a 4-day youth leaders training which will provide young leaders from poor and ethnically-mixed communities in Macedonia the skills, knowledge and confidence how to do peer-to-peer education and how to become more involved in their communities for peace-building and promoting intercultural dialogue. These leaders will then take part in the one-week summer camp which will follow right after the end of the leaders’ training as assistants to the trainers in the camp. The camp will have 25 participants in total (6 leaders and 19 participants) from four different cities in Macedonia which will cover the topics of peace-building and intercultural dialogue through interactive workshops, exercises, art workshop and theatre sketches. At the camp the leaders will be able to practically apply the skills and gain experience which will be useful in their future work in the communities, while together with the other participants will learn about stereotypes, non-violent communication and peace-building through various workshops. After the end of the summer camp there will be an art exhibition where the works produced during the camp will be exhibited in order to raise awareness about intercultural dialogue, human rights and peace-building in their communities. Eventually, the selected youth leaders, as part of this project and with the help of CoE, Mladiinfo and other local NGOs will organize subsequent small-scale workshop on peace-building, human rights and intercultural dialogue in their local communities. In this way, the project will have a wider outreach, while the youth leaders will become more confident and empowered to continue their work in this field.

Viktor MILOSHEVSKI, Association Center for Youth Activity

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Viktor Miloshevski has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Young People and Human Rights” from August 2011 to January 2013 held in Skopje and Kicevo, Republic of Macedonia.

The project aimed to raise awareness of human rights among young people and empower youth to advocate for human rights.

After a collection of data through anonymous surveys from several local non-governmental organizations it was held an on-day event during the International Human Rights Day with participants with different ethnicities and backgrounds.

During the day the participants explored Human Rights Education and non-formal education methodology as a tool for Human Rights advocacy, sharing best practices and planning and implementing street actions in Kicevo.

The two street actions “The wall of Human Rights” and “Human Rights photo messages” aimed to celebrate the International Human Rights Day and raise awareness about Human Rights. Moreover, the participants had the opportunity to further cooperate with each other and discuss further about Human Rights through a movie evening and forum theatre.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by bringing together young people with different ethnic and religious backgrounds together in joint activities in a peaceful multicultural environment.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it aimed to empowered young people to take action for the protection of human rights in a multicultural environment.

Shiva SALI, Association of Citizen Sumnal

My project idea

Project title: “ Roma are equal with the others and deserve a better tomorrow ”

In Macedonia the young Roma are target of discrimination and violent is used on them (beaten in school, streets), not allowed to enter clubs, swimming pools and etc.

So what we want to do is: To create space for them where they can spend time together mixing and learning each other culture, tradition, history, life in order to minimize the stereotypes and discrimination between this young people.

Also to work together on artistic activity and attend social events for 6 month. At the end to make big happening were we would show the result from this project to all the others from the community, so in that way they can see that positive dialog is possible.

Aim: Minimize the violent behaviour and discrimination between the youth Roma and Non- Roma. (Promotion of the positive aspects of multiculturalism in Skopje) through establishing dialog between 30 young Roma and Non- Roma throw artistic activity to learn about each other culture, history and tradition in order to raise awareness about possible dialog in the community.

The Netherlands

Joanna VAN DER HOEK, Saturday School project and CISV International

My project idea

The project will involve CISV volunteers who have gained a lot of valuable knowledge during CISV programs which focus on peace-education. They did so by doing activities related to human rights, peace and war, wealth and poverty, environmental issues, discrimination, stereotypes, different values and cultures and such. During my YPA-project CISV’ers will be inspired to pass their knowledge on to other youngsters living in their own community and get actively involved in local peace-building. They will be able to do so by organizing trainings in peace-education for ambitious youngsters who are involved in working with youth, but have not got any related expertise yet. These youngsters come from disadvantaged situations, such as having had a troubled youth, living in bad neighbourhoods or experiencing racism, second-class treatment and lesser career opportunities than other people their age - due to being considered as someone of a marginalized minority within society.

Upon receiving the training on peace-education, both trainers and trainees will develop their personal capabilities. Trainers will strengthen their skills and take their expertise to a higher level by implementing their knowledge in a different situation and working with other people than they are used to, whereas trainees will gain much new valuable knowledge on working with youth and complement their personal capabilities to a high extent. This will not only be a worthwhile addition to their curriculum vitae, but also strengthen their role in society and equip them with the right tools to respond to discrimination, marginalization and hate-speech.

After finishing the training sessions, the youth workers (along with CISV volunteers) will implement their newly gained knowledge by visiting schools, youth programs, community centres and such. They will teach people of their age about different values, cultures, opinions and living together in dialogue and dignity by doing simulation-activities, whilst making an effort to raise the interest in peace-education in our community. The trainees, who might have experienced some sort of second-class treatment due to racism and stereotyping, will now have the opportunity to set as a role model and make an adequate positive impression among society. The YPA project will enable them to stand out as inspiring, future leaders. They might even get some attention in the media, which would spread a positive message and could even help to reduce the occurrence of stereotyping and discrimination. Secondly, the trainees will inspire their participants to get actively involved in peace as well, by telling them about the MasterPeace project (www.masterpeace.org). By motivating them to take part in this campaign for peace, the YPA project will set some sort of domino effect in motion; in which young people continuously get inspired and then inspire others. Participants, who have received the training, will be asked to organize or create something related to peace-building, dedicated to the MasterPeace campaign.

Eventually, the YPA project might also lead to the organization of CISV community weekends/camps, in which particular groups of young people will come together for peace-education. Depending on the creativity and enthusiasm of its participants, the project could also come to a spectacular momentum, in which all former participants organize an event related to what they have learned.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Joanna van der Hoek has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community during various community activities in 2013-2014.

Among the various activities, it was organized a workshop on creative writing for young people with different backgrounds, with the aim of empowering the participants to exercise and defend their citizen’s rights. The target group of the activities were young people, involving directly 30 people.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices, promoting intercultural dialogue, developing constructive attitudes, including non-formal education, and Community based as it has an impact on the community and a link with existing initiatives, in addition to creating new connections.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by breaking the barriers of prejudices and raising awareness of the importance of intercultural dialogue.

Turkey

Zekeriya DÜNDAR, Community Volunteers Foundation (TOG)

My project idea

Human trafficking is considered to be one of the fastest growing criminal industries. Human trafficking is a modern day slavery. Since 1999, 250 000 people have been trafficked through Turkey and according to research most of them are women and children.

This project aims to create a summer camp combined with a human rights training course. The main idea of project create a social cohesion between neighbour countries through the young leaders and youth workers. Beside that it will promote the values of the Council of Europe.

The project will be in 2 steps. The first step will be a training course which aims to promote human rights, raising awareness while increasing the capacity of peace-building with non-violent activities/communication. As well will increase competance of using media in positive way. The second part will be a no border camp will be focus on peace-building activities, creating social coheison between neighbors countries.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Zekeriya Dundar has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Hand in Hand in For Children” from 20thto 27th July 2013 in Istanbul, Turkey.

The project “Hand in Hand for Children” was a training course which aimed to increase awareness of children’s rights violations. The project brought 29 young people from 7 different countries (Estonia, Sweden, Croatia, Netherlands, Greece, Bulgaria and Turkey) which worked with 20 children from Hasan Tan Orphanage.

There were two main objectives regarding the target groups:

to create a space for youth workers to develop their skills and work with children with difficult backgrounds such as orphanage;
to develop children’s competences in arts and provide them with a space where they would be able to share their thoughts about children’s rights.

The children from the orphanages participated in several activities, such as graffiti, games visiting modern art museum and painting workshop in Museum.

It was also created a facebook page with project’s outcomes and also articles, pictures, news about rights of child and children’s rights violations. The page reached more than 200 followers.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by bringing people coming from different countries and backgrounds and having a safe space to develop peacebuilding through the practical experiences.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it deepened human rights with a special focus of children’s rights and intercultural dialogue was promoted during the whole length of the project.

Murat KARABAG, Takim Yildizi Izcilik Genclik

My project idea

Turkey and Armenia have historical problems with each other and the societies are under false propaganda of the extremists and governments. As music is the language of the universe, by music we share the same feelings and it’s a shocking experience for some to see the “others” smile and cry with the same music – no matter if it’s in Turkish or Armenian. Music can “humanize” the enemy. Making the music of the “enemy” can bring some questions of the enemy and can break the barriers in the mind. Seeing musicians in harmony at the stage can bring some questions and symphaty to the audition.

The project consists of concerts in different cities. The audition in the hall and the viewers at different channels of social media (Youtube, Facebook, etc.) can see “humans” making music. Sharing and reflecting the same feelings is a fundamental part of understanding each other. Once the people will see that we can smile and cry together, they will not be affected/affected less by the false propaganda.

Ukraine

Yuliya IELFIMOVA/SAKUNOVA, Center for European Initiatives, Sumy city NGO

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Julia Ielfimova has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Inclusion of Roma Youth through Human Rights Education” from 25th to 31st October 2012 in Sumy, Ukraine.

The aim of the project “Inclusion of Roma Youth through Human Rights Education” was to prevent discrimination towards Roma youth in Sumy region schools and setting intercultural dialogue between them through educating young teachers and youth activities in tools of working with youth in Human Rights issues.

The project objectives were:

to train 24 young educators and youth leaders from Sumy region to work with school youth (10-16 years old) on human rights;

to promote non-formal education in work with school youth;

to learn tools and methods developed by Council of Europe in Human Rights for children;

to address the issue of Roma community in the region;

to address the cases of bulling and discrimination towards Roma youth in Sumy region schools;

to give an opportunity to participants to practice acquired knowledge and skills through developing and conducting Human Rights workshops in intercultural working groups for local school youth;

to contribute to the multiplying practices in Human Rights education for school youth;

to build cooperation and networking among young educators and youth leaders working in Human Rights Education;

to bring the issue of discrimination and bulling Roma youth into the society through campaigning.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by bringing together Ukrainian and Roma youth for a dialogue and exploring each other cultures.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it focused on the rights of national minorities in small communities and set intercultural dialogue between Ukrainian youth and Roma youth.

My project idea

Crimea is a multinational, multi-faith region. It has a very rich and sometimes tragic history. This fact causes a need to form a right society based on mutual tolerance of all the nationalities that live here. The Crimean people live in constant danger of interethnic conflicts, that's why it is of paramount importance to pay attention to this problem and apply energy to solve beforehand. Young people are the main force that can promote or oppose the conflict. Therefore in 2012 "Young Leaders Club" planning a special program. It will consist of two seminars in Crimea for 25 young people. The project intend to create a productive environment for young people of different nationalities for their personal development and deep understanding of need for peaceful co-existence and fruitful collaboration, among different nationalities in Crimea, promotion of intercultural dialogue and Human Rights, using the contemporary media and art tools. Training seminars will include thematic lectures and trainings on multicultural issues, as well, as special workshops on effective use of new media. Age of participants will be 18 - 28 years old. The practical results of the project will be created by participants during the workshops (videos, photos, pages on social networks etc.). Also, a presentation of these works in the higher and secondary educational institutions of the Crimea will be held. Furthermore, the use of new media tools will enable a wide dissemination of ideas of the project, not only in the Crimea, but also outside it. Also, through this project, we hope to influence the passive board, as well, as help the student Councils to become more active in solving intercultural misunderstandings.

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Anastasiia Maksymova has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “International Video-camp 25 Frames” from the 1st May to 1st June 2012 in Crimea, Ukraine.

The project aimed to establish a constructive intercultural dialogue between 25 representatives of different Crimea’s ethnic minorities Crimea by providing tools for the successful communication and interaction in the modern society.

The project, consisting of two seminars, intended to create a productive environment for young people of different nationalities for their personal development and create awareness and understanding of a need for peaceful co-existence and fruitful collaboration among different nationalities in Crimea. Training seminars included thematic lectures and trainings on promotion of intercultural dialogue, human rights and multicultural issues, as well as special workshops on effective use of new media.

The practical results of the project were created by participants during the workshops (videos, photos, pages on social networks) and presented in higher and secondary educational institutions of the Crimea. Furthermore, the use of new media tools enabled a wide dissemination of ideas of the project, not only in the Crimea, but also outside it.

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by promoting intercultural dialogue and developed constructive attitudes including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by giving the opportunity to work on a common multimedia project aiming to explore local peace-building topics.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it gave the opportunity to discuss about human rights and intercultural dialogue, as well as making the participants overcome their stereotypes and conflict.

United Kingdom

Thomas COTTAM, Hertfordshire County Council

The project idea

The local youth in an area of Stevenage, UK have little access to youth activities and opportunities for self-improvement. There is a distinct lack of youth participation within the community and also a lack of community cohesion. The project would respond to this by establishing a vibrant, sustainable, not-for-profit social enterprise centre in the local area, encompassing a community cafe and a range of enterprise 'pods'.

The community café (entirely ran by local youth), would be open to everyone during the day but would offer exclusive access to young people in the evenings (as a youth cafe). Here, young people from all different backgrounds will be able to interact, discuss issues, and take part in community activities. This would help to transform the current social cohesion conflicts and would also be linked in to a broader, large-scale community youth-led film education project.

The separate enterprise 'pods' would include a training pod, meeting pod, enterprise pod, music and media pods offering specialist support which would increase the skills of Stevenage young people. The ‘pods’ would provide a social/enterprise facility for all ages that would increase social action and grow a range of business and enterprise skills (economic and social rights). The pods would support the development of young entrepreneurs through a range of methods including mentoring support, business space, professional guidance and business start up opportunities. The pod would be a partnership of professionals and volunteers who would share their skills and knowledge to help turn the development of business ideas into reality. The initiative would promote volunteering, improve skills, regenerate a local area and improve community cohesion (decreasing prejudice and developing constructive attitudes as a result). The project will start in 2012 and be run in cooperation with the local authority and local NGOs. The project will need financial support, the mobilisation of other volunteers, support from my mentor and the Council of Europe. My role would be to develop the project in conjunction with partners and ensure its successful implementation, as well as effectively share updates with the wider YPA network.

My initiatives for peace-building

April 2011 – November 2011

During the practice phase, I conducted various activities as a Youth Peace Ambassador. These ranged from promotional to peace-building activities:

Promotional:

The Youth Peace Ambassadors (YPA) project was mentioned in a presentation on ‘Young People and Local Government’ to the Association of County Chief Executives (ACCE). (April 2011)

I wrote an article for an internal staff newsletter (distributed to over 4000 employees within my organisation) about YPA. (July 2011)

I delivered a workshop session on ‘Volunteering’ to a cohort of new employees to my organisation which heavily-featured my work on YPA. (September 2011)

Peace-building:

I became a member of the international human rights organisation Amnesty International.

I participated in ‘Belief in Dialogue’: a British Council-sponsored conference about the relationship between religion and science in Sharjah, UAE. This involved discussions, workshops, lectures and seminars on the interplay between belief and science in the modern world, an often controversial and conflict-ridden subject. Delegates from many different religious, cultural and ethnic backgrounds attended. The constructive dialogue that we undertook made some headway in diffusing tensions and removing prejudice. The conference created opportunity for dialogue in order to break down misconceptions and to develop new perspectives to contemporary global challenges. (June 2011)

I helped with the running of ‘Celebrate! 2011’, an event that recognises and celebrates the different cultures and ethnic communities within Stevenage, UK. Stevenage is a very diverse town and the minority ethnic communities do not often get the chance to celebrate their cultures and talent. This annual event grants the opportunity to do just that. It helps to bring the community together and encourage greater cohesion and respect of other cultures. (November 2011)

Within the framework of the Youth Peace Ambassadors course Tom Cottam has implemented a project promoting peace and dialogue in the community, titled “Pod53 Community Café” from January 2013 in Stevenage, United Kingdom.

The project aimed to improve the community cohesion and enhance youth participant by establishing a vibrant, sustainable, not-for-profit community cafe in the local area. The community café (ran by local youth) is open to everyone during the day but offers exclusive access to young people in the evenings as a youth café running events. Thus, young people from all different backgrounds have the space to interact, discuss issues, and take part in community activities.

The initiative promotes volunteering, improves skills, regenerates a local area and improves community cohesion (decreasing prejudice and developing constructive attitudes as a result).

The project was a Youth project which addressed conflict transformation by addressing prejudices and promoting intercultural dialogue within a human rights framework, developing constructive attitudes and including non-formal education.

The project is community based as it aimed to have impact on the community by linking with existing initiatives and involving other actors.

The project succeeded in promoting peacebuilding by bringing young people from different backgrounds together through inter-generational activities which aim to promote peace between generations.

It also addressed human rights promotion and protection and intercultural dialogue as it promotes economic and social rights through increased opportunities to be engaged in volunteering or entrepreneurial activities and promotes inter-cultural ad inter-generational dialogue through café activities the promotion of intercultural.